Things I’m Loving Friday #414

Good morning! I’m coming to you today one year older. It was my birthday on Wednesday and it’s hard for me to wrap my head around the fact that last year I was celebrating with a baby and toddler and a big kid and now my baby is a toddler and I have two big kids. Time is flyinggg. I’ll share more about my birthday below but the festivities aren’t over yet! We’ll be celebrating with friends this weekend as well at the Queen’s Cup Steeplechase, a series of horse races and festivities in Charlotte. We went two years ago and had a blast and I’m hoping the rain holds off and that the event will be wonderful this year as well.

I’m sure I’ll have more to share on Monday but until then I wanted to pop in today with my weekly roundup of favorites, Things I’m Loving Friday style!

Things I’m Loving Friday

• Turning 37

(Top: Bodysuit Tank / Jeans: GAP High Rise Barrel Jeans) 

As I mentioned above, my birthday was on Wednesday and it was a good one. It was perfect in its simplicity and included a mix of house stuff (I had a meeting to select cabinet hardware and interior and exterior door knobs), usual weekday activities and family time. The boys made me stories about ocean animals (Chase), scribbles (Rhett) and a chrysalis that turned into a banana that turned into a vulture (Ryder) and as a mom I’m pretty sure no other gift could’ve topped their sweet drawings and creative stories!

Ryan surprised me with a cake from Milk Bar and it was such a fun surprise the whole family enjoyed! (Worth noting: The cake was tasty and a neat surprise for a special occasion but not oh my gosh blow me away delicious and Ryan and I agreed we probably would not order it again.) We let the big kids stay up a little late because the weather was so beautiful and I loved chatting with Ryan as the boys ran around outside. It’s slowly sinking in that we won’t be in our current house for much longer and while we’re obviously so excited for the future, there’s a big part of my heart that feels sad thinking about this being my final birthday in the home we’ve loved so deeply for nearly eight years. Something about the looming move in some way pushed me to really feel present on my birthday and appreciate everything in front of me. There wasn’t anything mind-blowing that happened but just being with my family in a place we love with so much to be thankful for made it a very good day. The older I get the more I realize the little stuff really, really is the big stuff.

• Sandwich Bag Organizer

One of the things I am most excited for with regard to our new home is the fact that will will have a pantry! We currently store all of our food in cabinets in our kitchen and dreaming about having the space to organize our food and organize bulk items, kid snacks and other odds and ends makes me feel a million times lighter! I’m trying not to buy much until we’re actually in our new home but I couldn’t resist this Amazon find when it was a lightning deal the other week. I love the way it cleans up sandwich bags and makes them feel more organized and somehow actually kind of… pretty! I’ll be taking this one to the new house and cannot wait to dive into pantry organization in the new home!

• Teacher Appreciation Week Ideas

I know that the “real” Teacher Appreciation Week is technically next week but Ryder’s preschool celebrated a bit early and this past week we showed the amazing teachers at his school some love. My good friend Amanda headed up the week of surprises and came up with some of the most amazing ideas! I wanted to share a couple of them with you guys in case you’re looking for some ways to show the teachers in your life how important they are next week!

First, this gift card bouquet was a major hit! I simply cut out handprints on floral cardstock and then used double-sided tape to attach pics of all the kids in Ryder’s class to the handprints. We filled a personalized vase with the handprint bouquet and added in a bunch of gift cards (Clean Juice, Starbucks, Dunkin’ Donuts and Amazon which I added after I snapped this pic). For what it’s worth, I heard from a good number of teachers on Instagram who said they would love to receive something like this — gift cards seem like they are always, always a good way to go!

Yesterday the teachers received a “money salad” and salad bowls were filled with crumbled up money as “lettuce” and filled with salad spoons and gift cards. The little graphics attached to the top of the salad bowls were printables from Etsy!

We also had the kids make the teachers homemade cards, decorated the sidewalk outside of the preschool with chalk and did one of those fun “Card My Yard” signs along with a balloon arch outside the front of the school. Teachers are just the best! To all the teachers out there, thank you for sharing your gifts with our children and impacting lives in immeasurable ways. You forever have my awe and respect!

• Selling Sunset Season 5

This show is my guilty pleasure and when I heard another season was making its debut on Netflix I couldn’t wait to watch! I love the peek into ridiculous California homes and even though the clothing the women wear on the show does not translate at all to day-to-day mom life in Charlotte, I thoroughly enjoy the fashion and the faux-but-maybe-real drama.

For anyone else watching, do you think Jason and Chrishell really were ever in a relationship!? I cannot decide how I feel about it! I’m leaning toward yes but then in the same breath I’m like ummm okay, that relationship lasted a hot second and must’ve been a stunt for the show. Thoughts? To be honest, I don’t really care either way because I have a hard time believing reality TV is ever really reality and just watch it for the entertainment factor, so do your thang, producers.

• Friday Flashbacks

Pesto Grilled Cheese (I made this recipe twice this week — once for lunch and once for the whole family for dinner!)

Easy Post-Workout Snacks (A roundup of some of my go-to snacks to eat right after a sweaty workout!)

Question of the Day

What is one thing you’re loving this week?